"Dave Poole" wrote in message
...
Janet wrote:

I find that Perlite is good for encouraging rooting on semi hard and
softwood cuttings, but for hard wood cuttings they seem to do better on
gritty, sandy compost. Perlite doesn't seem to encourage them to produce
roots.

Fully agree Janet - I take very few hardwood cuttings nowadays and
therefore forgot to mention that for them, a denser compost seems to
be better. Its down to ensuring that the cut surfaces are in good
contact with compost so that as the sap starts to rise into the buds,
moisture can be easily drawn into the stem.

Dave Poole
Really pleased someone started this thread as I have been using vermiculite
on seeds with no regard to its PH and shall stop right away! I bought the
bag originally to run some propagating experiments but was not happy with
the results so I thought I would use it up on seed pots. I do use perlite to
loosen up cuttings mixtures so I have it to hand. shows it pays to research
good ideas before going ahead!

--
Charlie, gardening in Cornwall.
http://www.roselandhouse.co.uk
Holders of National Plant Collection of Clematis viticella (cvs)